OUTTAKE#2 (I own nothing but the plot)

AUTHOR'S NOTE: I am so glad you guys like it so far. Here's chapter#2 from EPOV. Poor guy is so confused. I kind of like writing these outtakes though because you all know the outcome already so it's kind of fun looking back to how Edward felt at first while knowing how he felt in the end of Real World. I mean this was quite an amazing journey from him. Read this while thinking of the guy who begged for more kids the day after Anthony was born... I don't know. It just surprised me to see how the story had gotten away from me. Lol.

-EPOV-

"Alice!" I roared. "Get out!"

Alice rolled her eyes and strolled further into my room. She was used to my short temper. It had been much worse than usual though. Even I could admit that. I just couldn't help it.

I had been walking on clouds when I first came back from visiting Bella, even though my family was pestering me twenty-four/seven, trying to figure out where I had gone. But... she hadn't answered any of my calls. She hadn't called me back. At first I had convinced myself that she was just busy, working on finals, and worrying about graduation. That would be just like Bella. But as the weeks rolled by and she still hadn't contacted me it became painfully obvious as to what was going on... she was avoiding me. And I do mean painfully obvious.

I knew we had moved too fast and now she regretted it. She was mad at me and now she never wanted to speak to me again.

"Stop brooding." Alice sighed.

I glared at her.

"I saw Bella." She said, picking up a book and flipping through it casually before setting it back down on the nightstand.

My eyes grew wide and my stomach flipped like it always did when I thought of Bella. I can't believe it had taken me so long to realize I loved her.

"Where?" I more demanded than asked.

Alice corked one eyebrow.

"Is that why you've been so moody lately?" She asked suspiciously. "You miss Bella?"

I didn't bother answering her. I just stared angrily back at my book.

"I knew it!" She cheered. "God Edward. When are you going to admit that you love the girl?"

I didn't respond. If she only knew that I had told her. The thing was that Bella had reciprocated. She hadn't seemed upset by my revelation in the least. She had seemed relieved and told me she loved me too. So the only thing I could think of would be that she was mad that we slept together. I knew it was too fast. It wasn't my intention when I went to see her. But one thing had led to another.

Now she was avoiding me. Just. Stinking. Fantastic.

"You've always loved her!" Alice continued her rant.

I huffed and sneered up at her.

"Are you going to tell me where you saw her?" I snapped. "Because if not you can leave."

"When are you going to pull your head out?" Alice retorted.

I bit back a comeback when I saw the true sadness in her eyes.

I sighed.

"I'm sorry Ali." I backed off.

I knew I was being a butt wipe. I was just so miserable knowing that I had finally told my Bella how I felt only to mess it up all within one weekend.

Her face softened, taking pity on me obviously.

"I saw her at the diner with Charlie." She said quietly. "She's visiting him before she goes to college."

I had really screwed up. She was in town and she hadn't called me? Usually she called me before she even called her dad. We'd always go get ice cream and chat before she went to Charlie's.

"She didn't tell you?" Alice asked.

I shook my head, trying to look indifferent.

"Nah, she probably forgot."

Alice corked her eyebrows disbelievingly.

"What?" I asked, already dreading her reply.

She knew something. Had she already put two and two together? Edward leaves for the weekend. He mopes around the house. And Bella refuses to talk to him for over a month. I guess it wasn't too hard to figure out. I had screwed up by moving too fast and now Bella hated me.

"Something just doesn't feel right here." Alice mused in the voice she's used since she started talking when she thinks she knows everything. It wouldn't be so annoying if she was wrong every once in a while.

"Bella said she's just visiting Charlie. But she was... different. Antsy."

She pursed her lips, thinking.

I frowned. Was she insinuating that Bella lied about the reason for her visit? Bella didn't lie.

"Like there was something she was trying to keep from me." She finished.

I rolled my eyes.

"Bella doesn't keep anything from you Alice." I replied, just stating a fact. Bella saw Alice and Rosalie as her sisters. They always knew everything.

But wait... had Bella told them I visited her in Arizona? I didn't think so because my sister, and Rosalie for that matter, would not let me get off that easy. They'd want to know the whole story. What had made me realize I loved her after so long? When exactly did I decide to get on the plane? What did I say when I saw Bella walking up her sidewalk? And the one question that was burning a whole in my head, how had I managed to mess it up in so little a span of time?

Because I'm an idiot.

And because Bella could be extremely enticing and... persuasive when she wanted to be. But obviously now she had changed her mind and regretted it.

Alice shrugged.

"I guess." She said thoughtfully. "But you should call her. She seemed more than a little freaked out and you know when she gets like this you're the only one who can calm her down."

I forced a smile and nodded which seemed to be good enough for my sister. She smiled back and walked out humming under her breath.

I looked at my phone. She probably didn't want to talk to me. On the other hand if she was freaked out I needed to make sure she was okay.

That settled it. I picked up my cell phone and hit my number one speed dial.

"Hello?"

She picked up? She picked up! But Alice was right. She sounded weird. As if she had a sore throat or something.

"Alice said you were back. Is that true?" I asked. First things first.

There was only static on the line. Was she okay? What had happened?

"Bella?" I prompted.

"Hello Edward. News sure travels fast here doesn't it?" She joked but her voice wavered. "I always forget that."

I can't believe that after everything we have been through in the past few months that she was joking around as if nothing had happened at all. I didn't know if that stung more than her evident avoidance of me or not.

And yet just hearing her voice again, no matter how strained, was enough to make my shoulder muscles relax just the tiniest bit. I imagined calling her randomly before all of this had happened. Even though she was states away I could still talk to her about anything. Absolutely anything and by the time I got off the phone I would always be smiling.

"I've missed you."

It just slipped out before I could stop it and I wanted to smack myself. She hadn't called to let me know she was in town. She hadn't even answered the phone the myriads of times I had called. Who knew if she had just mistakenly picked up the phone without checking her caller ID. It was something Bella would do. But maybe now she was trying to think of a way to get off the phone without hurting my feelings. And here I was being all emotional, making it harder for her.

"I've missed you too." She whispered.

My eyes widened. I was not expecting to hear that response. But I'd be lying if I said I wasn't overjoyed to hear it.

"Then why didn't you call me back?" I asked, praying for some painfully obvious reasoning like, Oh, didn't I tell you Edward? I was on a month and a half long excursion to Antarctica. I can't believe I forgot to tell you! Next time you'll have to come. But be warned, cell reception there sucks.

No. I was met with silence. Silence that sliced through my heart.

"You're right." I said abruptly. "This isn't a conversation I wish to have over the telephone. Where are you? May I come and talk to you in person?"

I didn't know how but somehow I would make this better. I couldn't lose my Bella. It had taken me too long to realize she was the one, as corny as that sounds. God, I sounded like one of those peppy girl band songs Alice listens to. With the sappy lyrics and the mediocre instrumentals I had always hated them but it seems I was willing to turn into them for Bella.

"No. I'll come see you." She said finally.

I smiled. It hadn't been a flat out no. Maybe we could work this out.

"Are you home?"

"I just got back from a run." I said. "I'll see you soon."

"See you soon." She replied and I hung up before she could change her mind.

~**~

I heard the crunch of gravel under tires, and then the engine cut off, but I didn't hear the door open. And no one knocked at the door.

I sat there in my room, just listening. I refused to go to the window and see what she was doing because I would feel like a stalker.

It had been exactly three minutes and twenty seconds when I heard the front door swing open. Not that I had been counting or anything.

"Bellsy!" I heard Emmett holler.

For the first time in almost two months a smile ghosted over my lips. My brother was such a goof. Everyone loved Bella but Emmett took it to the extreme, calling her his little sister. Bella and Emmett together was always highly amusing. Probably because Bella was the only one of our friends who didn't mind his 'do anything on a dare' attitude. As a matter of fact she had gotten quite a few good dares in herself.

There was silence now though. They were talking quietly, or at least too quietly for me to hear. The urge to look out the window was almost overpowering. I walked around my room, straightening things up. Picking dirty clothes up and tossing them nervously into the hamper in my closet, just to do something.

Then I heard the door to Bella's ancient truck open. It wasn't even that I was paying that much attention to it. You could hear the screech of the door opening from half way to China I'm pretty sure.

I heard footsteps on our front porch, Emmett's steps sounding like someone dropping boulders, and I couldn't take it any more.

I went to my door to wait for her. I was a mix of emotions. I was unbelievably excited to see her again but another, more prominent part of me was nervous that she'd never want to see me again. I had never cared much about what people thought. My friends tended to come and go and it had never really bothered me much. I had my family and that was all I needed. But I couldn't lose Bella's friendship. Even the mere thought was unbearable.

And then, there she was. She looked a little surprised and I wondered for half a second if waiting out in the hall way made me seem over eager. I didn't worry about it for too long though because she was here. My Bella was here.

"Bella." I greeted, a smile pulling my features without my consent.

She smiled.

"Hi."

With her smiling I couldn't help but to let the full smile burst out and I wrapped her in a tight hug.

"I missed you." I breathed.

She always smelled like strawberries and something else... something flowery that I couldn't place. I loved it. It was Bella.

"I missed you too." She said.

She sounded like she meant it and new hope was sparked for that Antarctica expedition.

She was here for not two minutes when I made her cry. Why couldn't I stop talking. I knew she felt bad about not calling me back, whatever her reasoning for doing so was. I could tell by the pained look in her eyes when I asked about it.

"Ssh." I whispered. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have upset you."

I led her into my room and sat her on the futon, trying to sooth her.

"I was just confused." She sniffed after a moment.

She looked tired and worn down. Alice was right. There was something big going on around here. She looked miserable and my heart lurched.

Had I caused her more pain than I had even imagined? I hated myself in that moment.

"Confused?" I repeated.

I had to know. If I had done this to her I had to fix it.

"As in confused about how you feel? Do you regret me coming to Arizona?"

Maybe she had said she loved me too out of reflex and now she was regretting it. Maybe she only loved me the way I had always thought. As a best friend or maybe a big brother. The thought made me cringe but I would have to take what I could get and I wouldn't make her feel bad for saying she loved me and then taking it back. If it was putting her through this much misery I needed to assure her everything was fine. We could go back to being... friends.

"No." She said, sounding appalled. "No. I was confused about a lot of things. I mean you live all the way over here in Forks and I live in Arizona with Mom and Phil and I don't have a lot of experience with relationships... okay, none. I have no experience with relationships. And it was the last month of senior year and I was stressed out and then-"

She seemed to cut her rant off in the middle but I didn't want to press her. I was so confused. If she had been worried about how we were going to deal with the distance why hadn't she told me? And was she still worried? Was she coming to me for answers? For assurance? Or did she just want to give up without trying?

"Why didn't you tell me?" I asked, running my hands through my hair.

Did she not think she could trust me with her doubts? That I would be angry with her. I didn't understand it.

"I'm sorry." She whispered, sounding pained.

God. Why couldn't I stop hurting her? Yeah, this relationship might work out... if someone muzzled me. I was messing everything up again and why did she keep apologizing? Did she think any of this was her fault?

"Stop saying that!" I said, sounding a bit snippier than I had meant to.

I took a deep breath. I needed to calm down. This wasn't her fault. I had been miserable, thinking she hated me. Waiting for her to stop avoid me but I suppose that wouldn't have happened if I had... I don't know. All I knew was that something was wrong with Bella. And I got the feeling she was holding something back.

"So it took you all this time to figure everything out?" I asked.

Was she still trying to figure things out? Because she sounded unsure. Maybe she didn't even want to try.

"No." She mumbled. "Yes. I don't know."

I closed my eyes and leaned against the sofa. Has there ever been a more confusing woman in the history of the world? Leave it to me to fall helplessly in love with her.

"It sounds as if you are still a little confused." I brought out.

What was I supposed to do if she didn't know what she wanted?

"I am."

Pain seared through me. What was there to be confused about? We were in love. We could work everything else out later. At least that's what I thought. Unless she wasn't sure she even wanted to be with me.

"Confused as to how we are going to make this work?" I asked hopefully. "Or confused as in you're not sure you want to try?"

It hurt to say the words but if Bella was just trying to let me down easy she wasn't doing a very good job. I tried to communicate silently that I just wanted her to rip it off like a band aid. It would kill me. I knew I would never find someone I loved as much as Bella. That's why I had applied to Harvard, the college she was going to. But if she didn't want me I would let her go. I would stand back and let her find someone that she did want.

"There was never any doubt in my mind that I wanted to be with you Edward." She said in a rush.

I looked up, hope filling me for the first time. Maybe we could still have the future I had envisioned for us. Going to college, studying together in the evenings, going out to dinner, coming home to visit our family during the three day weekends.

She looked away from me and I frowned.

"But there's something I need to tell you before you say anything." She said, her voice cracking.

I couldn't bare this. She looked so hurt, so scared. I put my thumb gently under her chin and made her look at me. She needed to know I was taking this seriously.

"I want to be with you too Bella." I said.

She needed to know that before I said anything else.

I thought I had made that more than obvious when I went to Arizona but maybe she needed assurance.

"So whatever you have to say we can work through it."

I was positive there was nothing we couldn't work through. There wasn't a hint of doubt in my entire body as she looked at me that we wouldn't be together. That we wouldn't end up with that future I had spent so much time recently thinking of.

"Because I lov-"

"I'm pregnant." She said before I could finish.

I froze. I must have heard her wrong or something. It sounded very much like she had just said she was pregnant. That was impossible.

My eyes flickered to her stomach without my consent.

Maybe it wasn't exactly impossible. But... I heard wrong. I know I did.

"Wh- what did you just say?" I asked.

There was a voice in the back of my head reminding me that it was very much possible and that it would explain everything. I told that voice to shut up. There could be another explanation.

"Four weeks after you visited me in Arizona I found out I was pregnant."

Holy mother of god.

The chances that I had misheard that sentence were slim to none. But it just couldn't be. She was going to laugh and say just kidding any moment. She was doing this to teach me a lesson. She was going to give me that grin that I loved and say something to the extent of, 'see what happens when you can't wait to get in my pants'

I looked at her hopefully. She wasn't joking. If she was her acting skills had greatly improved since the last time we had tried to convince Emmett that someone had stolen his jeep. It had been parked around the corner.

Her eyes were red and puffy and a few tears leaked out of the corners. This couldn't be happening.

My hand fell limply off her face and landed with a soft thud on the black material of the futon.

I blinked a couple of times and looked at her again. If she was pregnant shouldn't I be able to tell? And then I saw it.

Her hands were cradling her still flat stomach.

Holy.

"Are you sure?" I asked.

But all the hope had drained from my voice. There was no way she wasn't pregnant. I just knew.

She nodded.

"I found out the day before graduation." She said.

I felt numb. There was nothing I could do but sit there silently. I knew I should have been comforting her and assuring her that everything was going to be okay. But I wasn't even sure if things were going to be okay now. I mean... pregnant?

"I was going to call you back but then I found out I was pregnant, and then there was graduation, and then I had to tell Renee, and then I spent the next couple of weeks freaking out, and planning to come here to tell you." She said in one breath.

I still sat frozen as all the pieces clicked into place. Oh. I had definitely messed up. Just not in the way I had been previously thinking.

She took a deep breath.

"I didn't feel this was something I could tell you over the phone." She said quietly.

I can just imagine that phone call. Actually, no I can't. But then again I can't really grasp what she was telling me now in person. I mean I comprehended the idea of what she was saying but it refused to sink in. The words, 'pregnant' and 'baby' were bombarding my mind.

Bella moved her hands from her stomach and rested them on her lap and I shook my head. I hadn't even noticed I hadn't looked away from her stomach yet.

I tore my eyes away and let them rest on her beautiful face. She looked so helpless. I needed to say something but there was so many things to say I couldn't decide where to begin.

"What?" I croaked.

God, I was more of an idiot than I thought. Don't make her say it again!

"I-" I began again, but what was there to say?

I had always wanted children. I had even wanted children with Bella. But I had been thinking in the very far off future, as in nine or ten years from now. Maybe twenty...

We weren't equipped to handle this right now. We had just gotten together and we had spent the first month and a half of our new relationship not speaking. That was not what I wanted to bring my child into.

My child. As in... my child. Oh crap! I was going to be a dad. I had nine, no not even nine months to become a dad. I couldn't be a dad. And there was no way I could learn all of the things I would need in so limited a time. I was eighteen! We had just graduated from high school. How was I going to be a father? I couldn't even get out an articulate sentence at the moment.

"Oh my god." I mumbled, my voice hollow.

Bella laughed humorlessly.

"Tell me about it." She said dryly.

I felt another pang of guilt, the most intense one yet. I hadn't even thought of how Bella felt. This had to be harder for her than it was for me. She had to carry the baby after all. It wasn't just her emotions that were going through a roller coaster ride. Her body was changing. It's got to be harder when the thing you're confused about is a part of you.

"I'm just going to leave." She whispered.

I looked back up at her, ashamed.

"I'm- I'm sorry." I said finally.

That was the only thing I could think of to say. I just need a little while to think. And a long while to grow up, I thought.

Bella nodded understandingly. What had I done to deserve her? Nothing. That was the answer. I had done absolutely nothing to deserve such an angel and I sure wasn't doing anything worthy of her now. And she not only granted me friendship and love. She was carrying my baby.

I felt a little warmth spread over me. It was just hard to feel around all of the suffocating panic.

As hard as this was going to be and as frantic as I was I knew I didn't deserve this child. Bella's child. It would be the most precious being in the world if only because of who her mother was.

Fear gripped me. I hadn't really let Bella say anything. What if she wasn't planning to keep it?

"What are you going to do?" I asked just as she was getting off of the couch.

I couldn't let her leave without knowing. I still wasn't sure what to think, or feel, or say. I was kind of surprised that my body remembered how to breath for me with so much of my brain frozen with thoughts of *gulp* pregnancy. But that didn't stop the fact that this was Bella's child we were talking about.

She looked confused for a moment and then her eyes widened.

"I'm going to keep it!" She exclaimed loudly. "That... the alternative isn't even an option for me."

She sounded repulsed by the idea.

I sighed with inner relief. I didn't know what to do yet, my brain hadn't grasped the idea fully I don't think. But at least I knew I could think this through without worrying that by the time I had made any decisions it would be too late.

"Good." I said quietly.

That was an understatement. We were too young. We weren't ready to be parents. And knowing that it was coming, ready or not, without us having a say at all was... I don't even know how to explain it. But the thought of our child dying was more painful and frightening than all of those things combined.

Bella sniffled and I looked up to see a few glistening tears gliding down her cheek.

I sighed and swiped them off with my thumbs tenderly. This did not change how I felt about her in the least. The pain of seeing my Bella upset seared through all other thoughts.

"I don't know what to say, Bella." I tried to explain. "This isn't something I was prepared for... at all. I just-"

I closed my eyes and shook my head. I just what? I had no idea.

The only thing I was sure of at that moment was that the world had shifted underneath my feet and nothing was going to ever be the same. I was going to be a dad.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: I hope you liked it. Don't forget to review. The next chapter is going to be Carlisle's POV when he sees Bella's file. But then we get to move on to some fun stuff... the boys at Baby's R' Us. I can't wait to write that one. Haha